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Donna Maria's Handmade Beauty Connection
June 30, 2003

A Publication of The Handmade Beauty Network
ISSN 1530-9630 | Vol. 4, Issue 26
To subscribe, click here.

1. Using An Email Newsletter To Promote, Market & Grow Your Business, July 16. Speaker, dM.

2. How To Get Inexpensive Media Attention For Your Business, August 6, Guest Speaker, Katherine Hutt, Media Relations Expert

**And for those who can't make it to Washington, DC, you can enjoy the entire 3-part Success Series on one day in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, on July 23!! Click here fore details!

1. HBN Update: Welcome New & Renewing HBN Members!!
2. Handmade Beauty Recipe Of The Week: Simple Lip Balm
3. Handmade Beauty Trivia Question: win a 1-ounce bottle of cherry FO!
4. Create the Life You Love™: Moving Into The Future While Dragging Around The Past

BK Pumice, Inc. | Debbie Jenkins | Idaho
* renewing member; our Pumouse is a one-of-a-kind pumice product for personal use and household cleaning

Holistic Alchemy | Lisa Taylor Barger | Arkansas
* renewing member; Authentic Aromatherapy Soap -- vegetarian-friendly soaps and formulated for sale in small, privately owned boutiques and spas; no animal products

Lucyland | Lucija Kordic | California
* renewing member; soap handmade with seriously fine ingredients including Hawaiian grown macadamia nut oil, cocoa butter, South African rooibos and lavender essential oil from the Croatian island of Hvar

Camden-Grey Essential Oils | Vivian & Hector Garcia | Florida
* renewing member; essential oils, CO2's, hydrosols, herbs, vegetable and nut oils, waxes, preservatives and butters for the discriminating toiletries maker, aromatherapist, and soapmaker

Nature's Essence | Isabel Christian | Georgia
* cold process soaps, body creams, sprays, lotions and soy wax candles -- available unscented or scented with essential and/or fragrance oils.

Roundabout Garden | Stefani Peterson | Washington
* Handmade all-vegetable soaps, lotions, and skin cremes

Learn more about our members and their exciting activities by visiting their Web sites through HBN's Online Member Directory, now with 4 ways to search: (1) by state/country; (2) by member business name; (3) by keyword search; or (4) using our new alphabetical listings.

Simple Lip Balm is -- well -- simple. Submitted by a reader who likes making things but not spending all day doing it, this recipe is simple and good!

When you visit MakeYourCosmetics.com, it's easy to buy the ingredients you need by clicking on our Selected Supplier links:

Last Week's Answer: Restylane, Perlane, Hylaform

To win this week, be the first to state the name of the respected dermatologist and the ingredient and win a 1-ounce bottle of cherry FO!!

Please read the contest rules here before submitting your entry. Put "TRIVIA CONTEST ANSWER" in the subject line or your answer will not be considered.

While time does not permit me to respond personally to all entrants, the winner will be notified by email and their name posted at HBN's home page.

I recently read the story of a promising basketball player from a rough section of Dallas. In the mid-1990s, Angela Aycock was a rising star in the world of women’s basketball, yet the challenges of a difficult past seem to have rendered her helpless to move toward the promise of her athletic future. After several winning seasons and numerous honors, the toll of friends lost to violent crime, an absent father and losing a dear fellow basketball player to suicide, Ms. Aycock concluded that she no longer wished to be a part of this world. Today, she serves as a nun in a strict Canadian order. (To read more about Ms. Aycock's triumphs as a basketball player at the University of Kansas, click here.)

Without making light of the depths of Ms. Aycock's despair, and without underestimating the significance of her chosen lifestyle, in this week’s article, I'd like to focus on 3 ways you can ensure to the extent possible that whatever hardships you have endured and will endure do not sabotage your ability to move toward the promise of the life you love.

1. Place The Past In Its Proper Place.
No matter how wonderful a life is, none of us escapes difficult times. We have all endured the pain of the death of a close family member or friend. We've failed to get that coveted promotion, been fired from jobs and made terrible decisions that we wish we could reverse. No one can escape those things, for they are the stuff of life. We all have to deal with them. But what we don't have to do is drag our past around with us like an iron ball on a chain. While we may not literally forget those difficult times, we can make sure they are placed in their proper perspective in the past, having made us stronger and wiser for the wear. Iron sharpens iron so be thankful for the hard times for they improve our coping skills and provide us with the mettle to move forward with confidence and grace.

2. Take Stock Of The Blessings In Your Life.
My father-in-law is often heard to say, "It's a rough life, but you should always count your blessings." I think of this often when I feel weighed down by pressures or difficult times. Life is sometimes extraordinarily hard and irreversibly unfair -- no one said it would not be. But in the vast majority of cases, when the hard times are balanced against the blessings and the good times, the latter provide a wonderful counterbalance. When something undesirable happens to me, I often remember that it is but a small portion of the many things I am fortunate enough to enjoy in life. Sometimes, I even write the good things down and tape them to my bathroom mirror to encourage myself, foster confidence and drum up the will to move forward. These list of blessings help me see that no matter how bad things get, I still have a job to do and dreams to fulfill. The storm is always passing over.

3. Live In The Here & Now.
It is impossible to move toward a promising future while dragging around the ravages of the past. That is not to say that we should simply forget past hard times. We should not! Instead, we should aim to recognize them for what they are: past hard times. And since time passes, past hard times also pass. We must strive to live in the here and now, experiencing fully both the pains and the pleasures of life today, striving to deal with the difficult times without hurting ourselves, and also without hurting other people.

Many times when a friend of mine encounters a difficult situation -- whether it's a traffic ticket, a bounced check, a client not paying on time, a sick child, worn brake pads, a fender bender ... -- he yells out, "It's always something!!" I often respond, "Well do you want it to be always nothing? I mean, what would your life be like if it was "always nothing?!!" If it doesn't put things in perspective for him, it sure does for me. After all, we're all just experiencing life. No one escapes hard times so why sit around feeling like we are the only person who's having a hard time??!! Nothing happens to any of us that doesn't also happen to the rest of the world! The trick is to experience the difficult times as they occur without allowing them to root themselves like a poison in the fabric of our future.

Respecting past hard times for what they are -- past hard times. Always counting blessings. Living in the present. All easier said than done, all goals worth striving to achieve. And each of them actions which can help you Create The Life You Love™!